Weekdaily, 4:30pm
New Nick Hancock fronted quiz in the Perfection slot, boasting the longest set in quiz history if we recall what they were saying correctly. Six people compete for £10,000, deciding to work as a team or attempt to break away and take all the money for themselves. Sounds a bit like cycling.
Anyway, let us know what you think, not only about the show but whether you reckon it’s one word or two.
Given that it’s a £10,000 show in that slot, I’m presuming it’s working on the assumption that it’s going to be won maybe once a week if you’re lucky.
It’s a maximum of £10K but I believe that they always go home with something
Oh it’s Weakest Link style budgeting, forgot about that possibility.
Money won pretty much everyday because of the format – do not think £10,000 will EVER be won though as it is a gradual build up and people I expect too polite question one.
It is really tactical as a contestant that is competitive not just there for the day out and I got my tactics wrong
Not entirely sure where to put this post but..
Red or Black has been recommisioned according to buzzerblog
Weekly with a £500k rolling jackpot (Could be £3.5m if rolls over to last show – two losses in a row will see the biggest ever jackpot in UK history)
I think that partially proves that article might be a lot of bunk- ITV wouldn’t commission a new series if it thought it could get in trouble because of it…
Sounds a little like Schlag den Raab then!
So we can keep this post for Breakaway I’ve started a new post for Red or Black, thanks:
https://www.bothersbar.co.uk/?p=5429
Well the only things I have to say so far are:
1) Nick Hancock seems pretty capable hosting this, especially with lots of explaining to do.
2) These lightup name badges are from Space McDonalds aren’t they?
I love your second point there.
My thoughts:
I felt that the rules weren’t that well explained, and made the pretty simple game seem complicated. Shouldn’t be an issue I reckon.
Hancock’s a good host.
Nice set. Laser! Wireless buzzers!!
I’ve got a few niggles with it presentation wise, but the game is ok. I think it’s a grower, I feel a bit “meh” about it at the moment. I think the continual low jackpots around £2k could be its downfall.
I quite enjoyed that though I fear all the rules will put people off. It may get a second series but who knows?
I’m a bit ‘meh’ about it. I like the basic idea but for 45 minutes it’s a long watch. Essentially it’s always going to be a bit one-note until the last 10 minutes. I’d prefer the Perfection-style ‘two matches in a programme’.
There’s some interesting technical innovations, just a shame that the format’s so vanilla.
And *that* Impact font again. Pfff.
I liked it. A lot. But I there were a few things about it that felt… well, weird. It doesn’t have the same feel as watching the first series of, say, Pointless, where you knew it had legs and could last for a while.
The rules are just slightly too complicated for the average viewer to drop in and out of watching it, I feel, and stepping forward to answer a question is unusual, but just about works.
HOWEVER
Nick Hancock is a very good host indeed, and manages to account for the complete lack of “let’s meet the contestants” bit by making some very playful jokes in ways that the likes of Lamb/Walsh don’t quite manage.
The level of question difficulty is good for this time of day/prize money, though there was the occasional stinker that seemed to crop up (I know with anything it’s only easy if you know the answer, but I felt knowing the name of Tim Berners-Lee was much harder than knowing which English football team has a day of the week in it’s name… – and I speak as someone who knew the former question).
And to steal Mr. Peake’s point, Lasers. Wireless buzzers. Nice.
I had to come on here to say how much i enjoyed this. Plenty of questions but lots of strategy which i also like.
With it being the first show, like already commented, i had no idea of certain rules as they were not explained before they came into play. By this i mean the Breakaway player being able to add a teammate and the lives being stealable.
I also think they have pitched the questions just at the right level to keep the game flowing.
As much as i liked the set and the music could not help but think they had taken a look at The Chase and thought how can we do that show without facing legal action.
Anyway huge thumbs up for me, much better than Perfection.
My 2 cents:
Pros
Liked the nifty name badges with the lights on to represent the lives.
Decent mix of questions, though some were more pop culture-y than I’d like.
Hancock a competent host as usual.
Cons
The concept of ‘add another life to the game or take one from another player’. Didn’t like it one bit as I think it’ll be rather rare for someone to add another life to the game unless all 6 are still on the main track.
A wrong answer on the main track wiping all the money out seems too harsh, especially towards the end. Why not halve it instead? Might be budgetry reasons, I suppose.
The rules seemed far too complicated and weren’t explained too well, as Dan Peake has mentioned.
I’d have preferred 30 General Knowledge questions instead of having 21 on the categories on the board and 9 GK after those, although saying that, the category choices DO add strategy to the game.
Overall, it’s not a bad quizzer to add to the line-up to watch, I just thought there was too much back-biting in this first episode with that bloke breaking away early, and the team resenting it by swiping his lives, nobody pairing up with him to help him, then when the lass broke away towards the end, Linda was more than happy to join up with her.
Score – 6/10. Not quite Hall of Fame material, although I’d rather watch this than any more of The Plank Job, and I’m CERTAINLY NOT watching the celebrity ones this weekend.
Thinking on, if lives are only really important when someone ‘breaks away’, if someone on the main track has a life and the team gets a question wrong, why not give them the option sacrifice a life to either save the pot or at least halve it so there’s something left to win? Or would that add another complicated rule to an already complicated game?
I’ve just noticed how similar Nick Hancock sounds to Bradley Walsh!
Well, I enjoyed it more than I think I’d have enjoyed the DoND that was on today, for a start.
Possibly a bit of a slow-burner of a strategic game, but a good one, and there’s enough quizzing action to distract from the lack of pace. Agreed that the rule explanation wasn’t that great, and I can imagine the stereotypical old lady game show viewer going “I don’t get this” and flicking over to DoND.
I’m sure the Whole 19 Yards set was longer than this, or was it? Heck, would it have been in the same studio?
I’ll go 7/10.
Reading the credits – Dave Box was the camera supervisior so that places it at MediaCity or Granada (or ITV Studios Manchester – for corporate kissasses)
The Whole 19 Yards was Stage R at Pinewood.
Pretty sure this is MediaCity.
Some of the buzz surrounding this show when it got commissioned was that the set is 100 ft long IIRC.
They always have to explain the rules at the start of a series so hopefully that’ll calm down, I enjoyed it, say 8/10
The Twitterati, fairly unanimously, don’t like it – too convoluted, apparently, as feared. Favourite comment:
‘Nick Hancock was a brunette before this started.’
Just watched it, I enjoyed it actually, but blimey I wouldn’t be very surprised if anyone tuned in for the first five minutes gone ‘blimey’ and then switched it over. It’s not just that the rules seem particularly convoluted but they seem to throw new unannounced ones in every few minutes – oh you can steal lives now can you?
The set also lacks a considerable amount of soul. I’m usually pro-Tron-like sets but there’s something very key missing here, the gimmicky laser finish line doesn’t really help.
BUT. But but but. Once I got into it I enjoyed it, the set up is clever enough to be diverting and the questions fairly well pitched. It’s actually a fairly good representation of cycling road racing in quiz form, and Nick Hancock is very much a top end utility host.
I can’t see it being a hit, but I’m glad it exists.
It all comes down to what we expected compared to what we got.
What we expected – 6 people, 30 questions, someone can split from the group and go it alone for more money but are eliminated if they mess up.
What we got – 6 people, 30 questions in blocks of 3 with 7 of those blocks on pre-determined categories, up to 5 lives can be earned throughout the show, lives can be stolen off people, someone can split from the group and go it alone for more money BUT can ask someone to join them and help them but are eliminated if they mess up.
To be honest, outside of us, I’m not sure anyone was expecting anything.
I can’t make any judgement on this because I didn’t actually SEE it, and even reading the explanations don’t exactly make things crystal clear. So I have to wait until Wednesday, when I can ACTUALLY see it to give it a fair trial.
I really liked it, personally. Good pace, good set, the graphics were okay, and I thought that after a bit it became easy enough to follow.
My first gripe is that the background music was way too understated. Second, I hate shows like this that promise winning “up to x” but then make it virtually impossible to win.
I thought the format was very good, but I agree with everyone else. It’s a bit too complicated for the general public, and as much as I liked it I don’t think it’ll get a second run.
Also, is it just me, or does the correct answer noise sound the same as the one on The Exit List with an extra sound effect added? It would make sense, since it’s the same company.
We also got the Exit List’s “Let’s remove the route” noise.
The “correct answer” and “add cash” sound effects were practically identical to the “correct answer” then “one step closer” sound effects from The Chase, just a little more muffled.
Paul Farrer copying and pasting again. You think he’d be a bit more careful with Bolam/Foster hot on his tail.
So, Breakaway then..
The +’S
Nick Hancock..
The basic structure of the show..
The undercurrent tactical battle..
Rewarding the ‘choose yout moment to screw the rest of em’ and going it alone to win big
Very basic contestant intros, which I feared could go on for weeks when I saw the 6 of them at the start
The potential to actually win the £10,000 (unlike The Weakest Link)
A proper wi-fi hand held question system that works properly (looks over at Endemol and points at them)
The -‘s
The main stage is too small, and it looks like a identity parade at the start. They should be spread out more.
Too many bunched ‘extras’ decisions to make,(breakaways, extra lives) which wrecks the pace and makes it more of an effort to watch than it should be.
When Damien went alone, the red lighting/backdrops were lost when he a question wrong, as they had to use the same colour. Much better when it was the normal play blue colour.
Horrid font for the cashpot display, and lack of animation as more was added to it (personal thing)
When the green beam was finally broke, nothing really happened. No pyros, no extending varilite shows, nothing. I thought we would have music, flashing lights, and fireworks given it’s in shot for over half the show.
I doubt (unlike Pointless) this won’t make it across to BBC One to walk the rolling and barren plains of 5.15-land. I’ll watch it if I’m at home and around, but won’t go out of my way to Sky+ it.
Adequate. Nothing more. 6/10
I was lucky enough to be a standby contestant on one of the day’s filming at Television Centre. Enjoyed it both then and now, but agree that many will see it as slightly too complicated. I also reckon it goes on too long – twenty questions might have made it seem a bit zippier. Other than that, the general idea is a good one.
I’m liking the theme tune, it’s like a robotic glam rock stomper. Apart from that I agree with most of the other comments. A good concept, albeit a needlessly complicated one, with rules that have seemingly been made up as they go along.
Yeah I quite liked the theme as well, which makes it a bit odd there’s no more than an underlying buzz during the show itself.
i quite like it to be honest. yes they could have mentioned wrong questions destroying the pot at the start. and yes, the stealing of lives seems a fairly harsh rule to me, i guess they thought that 5 lives may be too many in game at one time, but i dont see why it would be.
but its a damn sight more interesting than perfection.
I’m going to be very interested to see what sort of numbers its getting by the end of the run, Perfection is actually a bit of a sleeper hit and this will have a hard time getting those sorts of numbers I suspect.
oh sure, perfection hits the ‘granny’ market, its effective tv. doesnt mean i like it!
I thought it was really good – first time I’d seen it but thought it was pretty easy to grasp what was going on. Got 24 of the questions correct which I was chuffed with – think its more tactical than it looks at first though – why didn’t the clever woman break away by herself??
From what I’m gathering there was added jeopardy of static shocks when people bumped into each other.
It might have just been me, sure it wouldn’t have been!! but I am sure I jumped loads during filming so watch the people walk forward when they progress as a group….
Thoughts from a quick iPlayer skim:
– 20 questions would probably be better than 30, and perhaps a Breakaway point every four questions would make things a bit better. That said, I understand that BBC Two wants 45 minute quizzers rather than 30 minute ones, and it does feel a bit overextended. Pacing seems odd – the end actually seemed quite rushed, but I guess that’ll improve over the series.
– I’d kill the “steal a life” rule and just add one every time. That said, I’m not sure people here have quite appreciated the potential strategy involved – you want the Breakaway contestant to get as far as they can on triple the money and without the risk of losing the pot (since they’re unlikely to get all 30 questions right), so early in the game it’ll be better to add an extra life if someone’s on the other track. If there could be a way of eliminating the lives entirely, it would make things much easier.
– Don’t like the title sequence just being shots of the not particularly interesting studio. Also not enamoured with the logo coming up on screen and smashing every time something vaguely interesting happens.
– Thought the final nine questions seemed easier than the rest (or maybe they were just better suited to my general knowledge…).
– Suspect episodes will get quite same-y quite quickly in a way that Pointless and DoND don’t.
Other than those gripes, could see it being pretty good if it gets a second run – good number of questions, good pacing, half-decent strategy and Nick Hancock is good with it – but I suspect it won’t.
I’m going to be interested to see how many times a team goes on to win, because I note with some amusement there’s a breakaway point after question 29 with one question to go. There is *no way* someone’s going to let that go, so he only way for the team to win is for someone to go for it and get it wrong.
reminded me of my views on theopening sequence there. yes more attention could have gone to that.
I largely agree with the points people are making, but feel that the whole package is pretty darn good; 7/10 after one episode (which translates to “preferable to Pointless, The Chase, Perfection, Eggheads, Countdown, Fifteen-to-One and so on” – pretty much every teatime quiz for quite a few years) but we’ll see how that changes over time. Hurrah for a game show with some actual game to it.
I’m not sure that the game is more complicated than, say,Turnabout or Box Clever. Admittedly those were a couple of decades back and perhaps the tide has turned, but it’s good to see that there can still be interesting gameplay quizzes from time to time. There are lots of rules, possibly slightly too many; for instance, it would probably be simpler and arguably more satisfying just to say that when two people break away, their lives are combined, they win together or lose together and can’t be broken up. That said, I think the staged introduction of rules works reasonably well and it’s a principle that people are happy with – c.f. the way that The Cube only adds the Trial Run in the second game.
There is a bit of clunkiness in the whole breakpoint structure. What the show needs is the presence of an interrupt. Lose the breakpoints and say that any contestant can break away at any point between any two questions, but don’t stop the show to ask the contestants “do any of you want to break away?” each time.
Interrupts are nothing new. They’ve been done well in the past and they’ve been done poorly in the past. Examples: Million Dollar Mind Game prompted the team about the availability of helps after every question, The Crystal Maze didn’t ask the team if they want to buy a locked-in colleague out after each game but there were no gameplay reasons involved as to saying when a team might or might not buy a locked-in colleague out, and It’s A Knockout enabled team captains to play their joker on any particular game without stopping to explicitly ask them on-screen every time.
I suppose the argument for doing it this way is that it’s more straightforward to the viewer what the team’s option is at every single instance. If you declare the presence of an interrupt at the start then either you don’t remind contestants at all and risk confusing viewers who missed the start of the show and were not there for the explanation of the existence of the interrupt or you do remind contestants from time to time and waste time.
Compare with 19 Keys, which explicitly used the “stop the game to try a key” motif as an interrupt in, pretty much, its purest form and seems to have gone down in public opinion as being complicated as a result, when really it really, really wasn’t. (Bloody Bacon.) There just needs to be a better way to enable an interrupt; perhaps it might just be as simple as explaining it once at the start of the show and flashing a reminder to the viewers on-screen from time to time.
Nick Hancock is a piss-taker, though he reined himself in on Duel, and he’s back to his piss-taking ways here. He’s also a bully, concentrating on those who will give him the reaction he’s after. I don’t like that.
I do tend to suspect there is a little bit too much saminess and 45 minutes of the same thing is pushing it a little bit, though the three-question pods are an effective and fun way of breaking things up. With a couple of rules taken out, 20 questions and maybe only 4-5 starting contestants it’s a great half-hour show. Damn the standardised 45-minute slot! I’m not a big fan of doing the same thing twice over in a single show; how about just commissioning two different shows, reusing the infrastructure to save money, each on half the budget from the same company instead?
This has got legs for the US market. Shoe-horn it into a US half-hour slot and they’d have to play it pretty zippily and snippily in order to fit. On the other hand, I think this gains more than most from the absence of commercial breaks, which would be a problem in the US.
Nick Hancock is a piss-taker, though he reined himself in on Duel, and he’s back to his piss-taking ways here. He’s also a bully, concentrating on those who will give him the reaction he’s after. I don’t like that.
All the opinions of Nick on this particular thread up to now have been positive – so without any disrespect, Chris, the words “there’s always one” spring to mind here… 😕 😉
Saying this in the spirit of a recent thread: I can’t help it if I’m right and everyone else is wrong.
Actually, that’s a bit flippant. There’s a serious point here.
Hancock is a piss-taker. I was surprised how much I enjoyed his recent guest hosting of Fighting Talk, not least because he took the piss out of the contestants remarkably little and he took the piss out of himself remarkably much. Self-effacement strikes me as a much more attractive character trait than abuse of his privilege as host, which is sufficiently irritating that I do not feel comfortable commenting on his facility with the questions.
I have a strong suspicion that he may show that he consistently picks on certain targets so there is a more specific criticism to be made than just “bully”, but – for a change – let me get my facts straight first.
OK, there was much less piss-taking in this episode than there was in the previous one, but there wasn’t zero. All the piss-taking in this show, as was the case in the previous show, was directed at the women. I don’t think this is coincidence. It would be interesting to see if the lack of piss-taking on Hancock’s Fighting Talk episodes similarly coincided with a lack of women. (A quick look at the usual source for such matters suggests Hancock hosted Eleanor Oldroyd once, in an episode that bears second listening; I can’t remember off-hand who his guests were this series.) And when Hancock wasn’t taking the piss, yes, he was supportive and he was good.
All that aside, another very good episode and it’s quickly becoming clear that this is a meaty and well-thought-out format. Without spoiling, it becomes clear that there is even scope within the format, when two players have broken away, for one breaker-away deliberately to give a wrong answer in the hope that the pack might choose to remove the other breaker-away from the game so that the single remaining breaker-away might keep all the prize money rather than having to split it between the two of them.
Any format with that degree of depth, richness and tactical subtlety to it is strong.
All this and The Exit List? 2012 has got off to a fine start!
I know a couple of contestants from Breakaway and they both said Nick Hancock was really lovely. Anyhow, do you think he got that question about US states wrong on purpose to get rid of the welsh lad?
“SPOILER! Oh.”, as we used to say in the twentieth century.
No, but it’s interesting to know that he could have done and it would have looked exactly like that.
When contestants on a Breakaway do effectively try to break away from each other, it will probably be an early contender for moment of the year.
Christ, is this really going to turn into ‘does vaguely lefty comic and sports enthusiast Nick Hancock hate women?’ because if so not only am I’m out, I’m probably going to shut the Bar until a modicum of common sense and basic perspective prevails. That he takes the piss is not in question, it bothers me very little and adds colour to what is otherwise a fairly dry show.
I think I would change it so once you and your partner make the run for it you can’t keep asking people to come along at each break point. I like the idea of the lead effectively changing hands several times before the end.
I would rather Nick take the piss out of the contestants with a smile (so any hint of rudness is surpressed, by letting the recipient(s) know it’s to get a cheap laugh to help things along) than present the show by autocue, and stick to the script so rigidly that the audience at home, by show 10, knows what line he is going to come out with next.
This is, regrettably a trap Nick Knowles falls into whilst skippering Perfection.
By the way, I went to see Duel being recorded, and Nick does use sarcie comments to put cocky contestants back in their place during recording breaks – and it works. A handshake afterwards and an off mic exchange once the game is over and it’s all forgotten…
..and I wish he would do Fighting Talk more often than Colin.
He’s the best stand in they’ve had by quite some way so I’m glad he seems to be permanent understudy, but the show is basically multiplayer radio Room 101 anyway so it’s not like it’s a big leap.
I find it a tad annoying that (SPOILERIFICNESS)the first team to cross the finish line together won such a pittance.
On the other hand, I’m shocked to have (MORE SPOILERIFICNESS) seen someone breakaway before the game started. Didn’t think anyone would ever be stupid enough to try it.
To be fair, the team only ended up with what they got because they kept getting questions wrong (4 times, I counted), wiping the whole pot out each time, which is why I thought it’d be better to give those players with lives on the main track the option to use a life to save the pot, since their only real value is when you’re on the Breakaway track.
I was dumbstruck as well that someone broke away at the first opportunity. I thought no-one would be stupid enough to go for it, even with the £1,000 bonus.
I hope at some point during the run we get to see a team of six split £100 between them.
And fingers crossed someone in budgeting will watch that episode and realise it might be worth bumping up the prize money out of 1990s territory to save face 🙂
They can afford it, right? *points at newsreaders*
Just a couple more observations.
When I was being a standby, they conducted quick interviews (in a Weakest Link stylee) with contestants as they were eliminated, or after the show concluded. These have obviously been junked.
Second, I’m not convinced that with two people on a breakaway with no lives and then getting a question wrong, that the ‘team’ should choose which one to go. They should both go. The whole ‘team’ suffers when they get a question wrong, with the reduction of the kitty to zero. The same should be applying to the breakawayers (there must be a better noun. Breakee? Breaker?)
Someone mentioned the possibility of a breakee getting a question deliberatly wrong to provoke the ‘team’ into getting rid of his/her fellow breakee. Is this not too much of a risk to take, especially if you’ve already proved yourself to be the stronger of the pair (as was the case on Tuesday)?
I’m liking it though.
Watching this on iPlayer. Honestly, not finding it as convoluted as I thought it was going to be judging by the conversation on here.
Really good game today worth a watch if you missed it.
I’ve actually watched all week and I’m out tonight, but I think I will watch later, ta.
Yep, I agree, best so far I’d say. I’ve been watching all week and will be recording them next week
Travis P suggesting this got 1.5m on Tuesday, which is actually a pretty good figure, I think, given Perfection was getting 1.8-1.9m and seemed very pleased.
Was watching this with my mom (who thought Greed was complicated past the point of comprehension) yesterday. If she could get the rules even though she came in 10 minutes into the show, surely the general public could figure it out easily enough?
I think it’s fine once it gets going, but I stand by the fact it tends to just throw rules in. Did we feel differently about the guy breaking away on Monday once we discovered partway through his run that the lives we thought were his could be stolen from him?
From actually watching it, although I got it all, I think the stealing lives thing was a bit sudden. But honestly that’s the only thing, really.
Not sure why there’s two different styles of clock there, too. Surely they could have rejigged the question clock for the BreakAway clock, just a bit bigger, a bit redder and for 5sec?
Also, just realized the sound for a wrong answer to a life question is the same one used on Paddy’s 2011 Show and Telly. I feel like I’ve seen it somewhere else, but I could just be making that bit up.
Aaaaaaaand never mind. It was The Bank Job that shares S&T’s wrong answer sound. Breakaway’s is different.
Well, what a game on today’s show! Someone breaking away right from the start and very nearly making it all the way to the end. I really wanted them to get the full £10k but alas, it wasn’t meant to be. Although it was hilarious that the remaining team members lost it all because they didn’t know that icthyophobia was the fear of fish and not dogs!
One of the (several) rules I don’t like is the one about losing all the money. If six people can’t answer a ‘general knowledge’ question, is that because of a poor team performance or, perhaps more likely, the question’s too bloody hard? I mean, what kind of question editor would set a question that none of six contestants can answer. Ah, erm…
I suppose there has to be some jeopardy, but what you’re creating here is essentially a point at which you can say “Don’t bother watching the first 20 minutes”. Personally, I’d say halving the total would’ve been better.
There seems to be a regular git of a question in slot 29, which seems a mite unfair.
A nasty Q29 is just ridiculous. It basically means the show gives away practically nothing as often as not.
It’s one of the worst examples of “advertise a decent prize and then be utterly tight bastards” I’ve seen in a long time, and it’s almost enough to ruin the entire format. If it were for properly high stakes – at least an order of magnitude above where they are now – I’d almost forgive it.
But in practice this hasn’t actually been the case, has it?
Not very often, but they might have frontloaded the episodes where there actually are four-figure wins.
OK, let’s hope someone’s keeping track. There are only 20 episodes in this run after all.
What is a normal winning amount on the show?
A few grand.
Really good shows this week I thought, would love to see someone breakaway right away and win the 10k
Surprised he knew where The Generation Game came from, but didn’t know that Mastermind’s theme was Approaching Menace. Thought that was a pretty easy question.
I was screaming the answer at the tv if that helps
Interesting scenes today although I swear the rules on the break points change every day – I had the impression that once “something had happened” at the break points then that point was “used up.” – Probably my error.
I really wish Nick would just say “category.” Subject category is just redundant, isn’t it?